Читать книгу Don't Let Me Go - J.H. Trumble - Страница 17

Chapter 12

Last November 20

The first time

It was Juliet who came up with the coming-out plan. First stop, the counselor’s office, the day before Thanksgiving break, a move designed to give us both support and time before the big reveal the last week of school before Christmas break. It went ... well. Ms. Raney was surprised, shocked even, titillated maybe, amused, who knows, but she hid it well. She’d offered both her support and her advice: Tell your parents. Hmph. Not likely.

The halls were empty when we left Ms. Raney’s office. We took our time walking back to our respective classes.

“Why don’t you come crash at my house tonight?” Adam said.

I stopped and looked at him. “Are you crazy? I can’t spend the night at your house.”

“Why not? We’re two guys.” He laughed another of those mischievous laughs. “That’s the beauty of dating someone from your own gender ... until you come out, you can share a room and nobody thinks a thing about it.”

For the rest of the afternoon, I tried to dismiss the idea as mental, but the seed had been planted and my overstimulated imagination had been growing it until the idea had fingered its way into every nook and cranny of my thought processes.

I felt completely transparent as I pulled up a chair at the bar for dinner. Grandma handed me a plate as Mom poured tea and caught up on the day’s news on the TV situated in a corner of the bar. “Okay if I stay over at Adam’s tonight?”

I probably should have left it at that, but panic and guilt made me want to justify the question. “We’ve got a government project due before Christmas. A couple of the guys and I thought we’d get a head start. I’ll be home in time to help with pies and stuff tomorrow afternoon.”

I sounded like a moron. A guilty moron. I expected suspicion at the very least, but Mom didn’t even look away from CNN.

“Okay,” she said. “Be sure and take your toothbrush.”

“Um, sure,” I said.

“When are you going to bring that nice boy back over for a visit?” Grandma asked. “He’s a great dancer.” She did a little Fred Astaire move in the kitchen.

I kept my head down. “I’ll tell him you said that.”

I tried to look unhurried as I cleared my dishes and headed upstairs to throw a few things in a bag, sure that at any moment I’d do something that would give me away, but it was ridiculously easy. I scrubbed in the shower, brushed my teeth twice, flossed, and ran some product through my hair, then thought twice and washed it out again. Any more primping would have been too obvious. I crammed a few things in my backpack and hurried to the stairs. I was halfway down when I remembered my government book. I’d planned to carry it under my arm for visual cover. I wanted to take the stairs three at a time and then jump the last half, but I forced myself to a less-eager pace.

“I’m going, Mom,” I called out.

She stuck her head around the corner, a dishtowel in her hand. “Have fun. Be back by four o’clock, okay?”

“Okay.”

I’d never given my mom any reason to distrust me. I was working on a whopper right now.

My partner-in-crime met me at the door.

“Oh, hey, you brought your government book.” He rolled his eyes and laughed.

“Yeah, well ...”

“Hi, Nate!” Adam’s mom called through the house from the back porch.

“Come on,” Adam said and led me through the family room. His mom and stepdad were stretched out on lounge chairs next to the pool, cocktails in their hands. They looked relaxed and content.

I wondered for a moment what it would be like to sit out here with Adam, like a real couple, tiki lamps flickering around the edges of the patio, tiny lights twinkling among the tree branches.

“How are you?” Mrs. Jensen asked. “It’s nice to see you again.”

I stuffed my hands in my pockets and shuffled my feet. “I’m great, thanks,” I said.

“Nate’s going to crash here tonight,” Adam said. “That okay?” I couldn’t believe he hadn’t even asked them yet. I felt like an idiot standing there with my backpack slung over my shoulder.

“Of course! You’re always welcome, Nate.”

“Uh, thanks. My, uh, Mom is, uh, out of town tonight. And we have a government project.”

I held up my book. Oh, brother. I realized how lame that sounded as soon as I said it. But what was I going to say? Thanks. I’m here to bang your son. Is that okay with you? I felt their eyes on me and was relieved when Mea turned their attention away.

“Hi, Nate!” She waved. She was sitting on the edge of the pool, swinging her legs back and forth, making little splashes that fell just short of getting her Little Mermaid pajamas wet.

I waved back.

Adam pulled my sleeve toward the house. “We’re going to watch a movie or something upstairs.”

I was trying not to imagine what that or something might be, but that wasn’t really working out for me, so I prayed I’d be swallowed up before I embarrassed myself further.

“And your project?” his mom called after us.

“Yeah, we’ll get to it eventually.”

She smiled. “Okay. Would you take Mea with you? I’ll be up to put her to bed shortly.”

“Sure. Come on, brat.”

Adam scrolled through the On Demand listings. “How about Othello?” he asked. “Forbidden love.” He flicked his eyebrows at me.

“Othello? What’s Othello?” Mea said.

“It’s a sedative for little girls,” Adam said.

“Huh?”

“Shouldn’t we be watching football or something?” I asked.

“Football?” He laughed. “Surely you jest. If my parents caught me watching football, they’d know something was up for sure,” he said quietly. “No, Othello’s got it all ... love, passion, danger ... and he gets it in the end. It’s perfect.”

I was pretty skeptical still, but I didn’t think I’d be watching the movie anyway. It was hard to focus on anything with Adam around. He was still the sexiest thing I had ever seen. I blushed, thinking about the night ahead. What would midnight feel like? Two A.M.? Four? I made a mental note to google the inventor of door locks and light some candles for him (or her).

I was sprawled out on one side of the wraparound sofa in the media room. He must have noticed the effect he was having on me. He winked and tossed me a leopard print throw. “Children,” he mouthed.

I caught the throw with one hand and draped it over my lap, embarrassed.

Mea insisted her big brother braid her hair so it would be “full and bouncy” in the morning. I divided my attention between the movie and the salon activity unfolding in front of me. Adam pulled Mea’s hair up into a ponytail on the top of her head, then meticulously divided her hair into three sections, which he then carefully braided down to the very tip and secured that with another smaller band. When he was done, she kissed him on the lips and then snuggled in his lap. Her thumb made its way into her mouth.

He kissed the top of her head as her eyelids grew heavy. My throat tightened. He caught my eye and smiled sweetly. I would have been content just to watch them like that all night long. Well, maybe not all night. Okay, I couldn’t wait for Mea to go to bed.

Adam’s stepdad came up to tuck her in a short time later. She was sound asleep by then. He stuck his head in again on his way downstairs.

“Your mom and I are going to bed soon, Adam. Be sure you turn off all the lights before you go to bed.”

Adam assured him he would.

“Don’t stay up too late, boys.”

And then we were alone. I started to get up and move closer, but Adam shook his head.

“Not yet,” he said softly.

After Othello stabbed himself and died, Adam grabbed some random movie without even looking at the case and shoved it into the DVD player. It didn’t matter what played next. We leaned on our elbows facing each other across the expanse between couch ends and passed the time with small talk and long silent gazes.

“Your feet are warm,” he said, folding his toes into the arch of my foot.

“You know what they say about warm feet.”

“What do they say?”

“Warm feet, warm heart.”

He grinned. “I believe the saying is cold hands, warm heart.”

“Hmph. Then what do warm feet mean?”

“I have no idea, but I intend to find out.”

I sucked in a shaky breath. I desperately want to touch my lips to his, to explore all those secret places. My whole body ached with holding back.

He seemed to understand. “I’ll be right back,” he said.

In less than two minutes he was back in the doorway. He motioned for me to come with him.

My heart hammered against my ribcage as I cast the throw aside and reached to take his hand. This was it. Terrified hardly described what I was feeling.

The last time I’d been in his room—the first time—I’d been too self-conscious about getting naked with him, in the same room, at the same time, naked, together, to really notice the space he occupied every night. I’d just had my first date with Juliet, a disastrous couple of hours that had ended in a not-so-disastrous romp in Adam’s pool, fully dressed. I’d stood in almost this very spot, dripping on his carpet, when he’d tossed me a pair of sweatpants and a dry T-shirt. I took about two seconds to look around now. Neat. Orderly.

I found it odd that he hadn’t brought me up here again in the nine weeks now that we’d been together. But it had been my idea to stay on the down low. With two confidantes under our belt, and more to come soon enough, I guess we weren’t so down low anymore.

I took in a deep breath and blew it out as Adam secured the door lock. I checked it with my free hand, just to be sure. He shook his head and laughed quietly, and then his laugh dissolved into a shy grin, and he let go of my other hand and crossed the room. “When I count to three, you turn off the light, okay?” he said.

Intrigued, I did as he said ... on three. And suddenly the room was awash in the soft light of a dozen or more lava lamps. They lined a high shelf that ran the entire width of one wall—different sizes, different colors, glitter, no glitter. Adam stood on a chair and unplugged one of the smaller ones and removed it from the shelf. He put it on the table next to his bed and plugged it back in.

With his back still to me, he shuffled through playlists on his MP3 player until he found one he wanted. I watched him from the door. He settled the player into the speaker system and adjusted the volume so it played softly in the background, then turned back to me.

My entire body thrummed like a taut steel guitar string. “Do you want to play Internet poker or something?” I asked.

He laughed and deftly pulled his T-shirt over his head. “Uh-uh.” He tossed it to the side.

I started toward him, but he shook his head and told me to wait. I drew in a ragged breath and held it, keeping my eyes locked on his as he unbuttoned his shorts. “You’re not sneaking peeks in the first grade boys’ bathroom anymore, Nate,” he said gently. “It’s okay to look. No shame. I want you to look at me.”

I wanted to look. God, I wanted to look, but my eyes were fused to his. When I hesitated, he rolled his eyes playfully and reached into his bedside table drawer and pulled out a sparkly pink mask rimmed in pink fluff, the kind girls wear over their eyes to block out the light when they sleep, although I’d never known anyone to actually wear one. Across the front it read The Princess Is Sleeping.

“What else did you steal from Mea’s room?” I asked.

He smiled sheepishly and fished a pair of toy handcuffs from the drawer.

“Kinky.”

He dangled them from his finger. Oh, hell yeah. I came closer and took them from him with a trembling hand. He pulled the princess mask over his eyes, then turned and put his wrists together behind his back and waggled his fingers at me. Suddenly I understood what this was all about. I locked the toy cuffs around his wrists. The fit was tight and I had to be careful not to pinch his skin. He turned back. When the rest of his clothes lay in a crumpled pile on top of his T-shirt, I finally allowed myself to take him in, my eyes to linger where they’d never been allowed to linger before, my hands to touch what they’d never been allowed to touch before. And I wanted to tell him thank you ... for this amazing gift, for not mocking me for wanting you so badly, for making it okay to be me.

The lava was warming up, rising and stretching into elongated blobs, creating colorful shadows that were easing across the ceiling, when Adam said hoarsely, “Nate, get these fucking cuffs off of me. Now!”